


tugging on my heartstrings

by chasing_the_sterek



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Fluff, M/M, Nobody Disintegrates AU, Sharing Emotions, Soul Bond, Telepathy, They can feel each other's feelings, Tony returns to Earth, a lil bit, a little bit of BAMF Thor tbh, but yeah this is just pure fluff, don't worry i'm gonna clean it up and lengthen it, how do you even tag something like this, i promise it's not angsty no matter how the title looks, mental links, so i hijacked their post and left thirty minutes' worth of half-asleep babbling on it, someone asked for some fluffy stony to cheer them up after infinity war, this is that babbling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 06:08:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14514177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chasing_the_sterek/pseuds/chasing_the_sterek
Summary: Thor claps a hand on his shoulder in what Steve thinks is commiseration, but turns out to be sending a wave of something through him that makes his breath shudder out of him in shock.Bucky is suddenly at his side, saying, “Steve?Steve?”///Fluffy fix-it





	tugging on my heartstrings

**Author's Note:**

> Look. I'm sorry in advance about the writing. And. All of it.
> 
> Blame bootlegrobertdowneyjr. On tumblr.

Steve blinks at Thor. “They’re what?”

“Alive,” Thor says. “You did not know?”

“How the hell would I know that?”

“We fought together, dined together, and lived in the same building for a time,” Thor says, like it’s obvious. “We have an established bond. Is it not the same in your cultures?”

Steve stares at him. “No.”

“Ah.” Thor claps a hand on his shoulder in what Steve thinks is commiseration, but turns out to be sending a wave of something through him that makes his breath shudder out of him in shock.

Bucky is suddenly at his side, saying, “Steve? _Steve?”_

“He is alright,” Thor says, holding up Natasha and looking somewhat apologetic. “I did not expect it to be so much of a surprise to him, but he is physically sound.”

Steve would be angry, but he can see inklings of guilt on Thor’s face, and in the end he just can’t muster it up. “Think this is what people these days call trippy, Buck,” he breathes.

Bucky snorts, carefully letting him support his own weight again. “At least one of us finally understands it.”

Thor says, “You are taking it well, but I am thankful I thought to only introduce one other’s emotions, regardless.”

The other person is alarmed-confused-curious-suspicious, not fight-or-flight-confused like Steve probably would be if he suddenly got beamed with someone else’s feelings on top of his own. It doesn’t match Nat, or Bucky, or anyone else here in the clearing. Thor would have mentioned if it were him. That leaves Clint, Bruce, and - Tony.

“Whose are they?” Steve asks. He thinks he knows already.

But he has to be sure.

Thor opens his mouth, and says, “It’s Tony.”

///

“Mr Stark?” Peter is waving a hand in front of his face, looking concerned.

“Present.”

Except he’s absolutely not, because he has twice the amount of emotions he had before, and no idea how they got there. It’s not even some kind of double-whammy kind of deal, because they’re not _his._ And he knows that because he can _"feel it",_ and goddamn, he hates magic with a passion.

It’s pursuing a wizard that got him stuck up here in the first place, too, so he has even more reason to feel salty than before.

“Ugh,” he says, accidentally. Well, it’s less of a _says_ and more of a _vocalises,_ since it’s arguably not a word -

“Mr Stark? Are you okay?”

“Peter,” Tony says, voice deliberately level, “if you don’t stop waving your hand in front of my face, your next suit will not have webslingers.”

“I use them to get around,” Peter protests. He drops his hand, though, so Tony wins. “What happened? One second you were fine, the next -”

“Your brain went kaput,” Other Peter interjects helpfully. He looks back at all the faces staring at him, and says, “What? That’s what it looked like.”

Tony groans. He doesn’t trust this, doesn’t like it one single bit, but at least it’s interesting. Scientifically. He has no interest in another person whatsoever, or their feelings, or such related things.

The touch of cold fingertips on the back of his palm. Tony snatches it away, was briefed on this trick when they planned their fight with Thanos, but it’s too late: Mantis is shuddering with the overload, eyes wide and antennae lit up like a Christmas tree.

“You feel so many things,” she whispers. “Too many things for one person.”

Tony had already worked that out for himself, thanks. At least force of will and a racing mind seem to be capable of keeping his own overload at bay for now. “Yup, got that bit. Now I just need to figure out whose stupid emotions these are.”

He glances down at his chest like it’s going to give him answers. Peter follows his gaze like he thinks Tony’s stare is enough to make a little man climb out of his arc reactor, wave, and apologise for spilling all of his damn emotions everywhere. How that kid can be so earnestly trusting of Tony yet so solidly capable of taking care of himself in every respect, he’ll never know, but he does know that it’s going to kill him someday.

Persona Número Dos is all confused-amused-alarmed-curious. The fact that alarmed is the strongest emotion on the list probably means the fucker knows what’s going on, and isn’t sharing with the class. Bastard.

“Right,” he says, drawing himself up. They have an emotion-reader, two genuises/genii, a space thief, a man who doesn’t deal with the metaphorical and isn’t wearing a shirt, and a wizard. Surely they can work this out. “First person to tell me who’s on the other end of this heartstring-phone connection line wins.” He holds up three fingers. “3, 2, 1, go.”

///

It takes two weeks to get back to Earth. Along the way, Tony figures out a) it’s Steve Rogers on the other end, because of course it is, b) the broadcasting is mutual, c) Wizard Cop over there can’t use his wiggly magic fingers for some dumb reason, and d) he and Steve can send messages and photos to each other telepathically, which is fun until one of them gets a headache.

Landing on Earth is tricky. They’d salvaged enough parts of the original ship they’d come on to give them rough steering, directional force, artificial gravity, and oxygen, and then set off on the longest road trip Tony has ever been on (and he traveled most of Afghanistan by car).

When they land, Steve and the others are there to meet them. Wizard Cop's Dolorean fingers start miraculously working again almost as soon as they touch ground, so gets to go back to his big house and fancy, no-touchy cauldrons with his friend, but nobody else has anything better to do, apparently, because they all trail after Tony like ducklings.

“Hi,” Tony says, coming to a stop in front of Steve. They’ve talked so much on Brain FM that neither group need to ask how the others are. Tony revels in the idea of not having to debrief.

Steve asks anyway. “Hi, yourself. How was space?”

Tony quirks his eyebrows at him. “I think I’m going to have the Spinners stuck in my head for the rest of my life,” he announces, and then steps to one side, sweeping an arm out to encompass the Space Misfits and Peter, all of whom have started to mingle - except for the latter, who is trying to discreetly film them on his phone. Tony glares at him.

Steve huffs laughter, reaching out carefully to tug him back into his personal space. It's like he can’t believe Tony is really here, on Earth, not in space bitching down to him about how universally terrible long-distance flight food is; the feeling is mutual, echoing across the link like yelling in a cave.

They’re not touching. Tony can feel Steve's body warmth anyway. He breathes in steadily, uses it to ground himself, and goes back to what he was saying before.

“Now, I made Spiderman over there an honorary member of the Avengers, so I hope you don’t mind that, first off -”


End file.
